CAIRO: Islamophobia victim’s father, Ali Al-Sherbini is demanding that his daughter’s murderer receive nothing short of a death sentence, even though capital punishment is illegal in Germany.
The father is also demanding the maximum punishment for the court guard who shot his son-in-law during the altercation. He told Bild, a German newspaper, “I can’t believe my daughter was killed merely for wearing the hijab.
Al-Sherbini told the local press that a French lawyer has volunteered to represent Marwa’s family pro bono in Germany. “God loves my daughter, and has made her a symbol of hijab in Muslim and European communities around the world, said her father.
Marwa was three months pregnant when she was stabbed to death 18 times by a German of Russian descent two weeks ago. Elwi Okaz, her husband, was also attacked by his wife’s assailant as he tried to save her. He was then shot in the leg by a confused courtroom police guard.
The grisly murder has drawn global attention. The Egyptian media and blogosphere was outraged both at the crime and at the international media’s slow reaction to the murder and the mild media coverage it garnered.
Eventually the Western media caught on, with articles about the cruel murder appearing in the UK’s The Guardian, the LA Times, and the Irish Times.
In an interview with the German Bild, Marwa’s father said that he heard the news of his daughter’s death from one of her friends. Al-Sherbini added that the German government did not report the incident and that he couldn’t believe it until both the Egyptian government and the Egyptian embassy in Berlin confirmed it.
The paper said on Monday that the slow reaction to the incident is enough to deal a heavy blow to Muslim-German relations and to cast a shadow on whether they can count on German support to pursue their rights.
The German paper further reported that the German Prosecutor General’s decision to instate a publishing ban on details of the murder case has ulterior motives, according to the deceased’s family.
Marwa’s brother Tarek Al-Sherbini told Daily News Egypt in a telephone interview that “the Germans are trying to keep the case in the dark.
Der Tagesspiegel, a German newspaper has asked Chancellor Angela Merkel’s government to allow protests against racist attacks. On Monday, the German paper said that silence over the murder of Marwa Al-Sherbini is “dangerous.
According to the Associated Press, Merkel’s spokesman said during a conference on Monday that hostility towards Muslims will not be tolerated in Germany.
What is important is that everyone who can speak for the German government has made it clear in the past days that in our country there is no tolerance of xenophobia, no tolerance of hostility toward Islam, said spokesman Ulrich Wilhelm.
On Monday the Egyptian governorate of Daqahliya, which lies northeast of Cairo, held a public funeral for Marwa, where people held up signs condemning her murder and calling for retribution. Several city officials attended the service.
Meanwhile, there have been reports stating that Dresden is mulling ways to honor Marwa.
A meeting with town representatives and the Central Council of Muslims is set to take place next week to decide how we can honor her, Kai Schulz told AFP, adding discussions would also take place with the woman s family.
The city s immigration officer, Marita Schieferdecker-Adolph said: We are thinking of naming one of the city s streets after her, but the last time we wanted to do that, it took 16 years.
